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Posted on 01/25/2011 10:43:11 AM PST by EveningStar
On June 23, 1911 the Miami Metropolis published predictions about the year 2011 from the one and only Tommy "Dumbo Killah" Edison.
Edison makes some amazing predictions about a future of golden automobiles, the discontinuation of gold as currency, the rise of steel and the death of the steam engine. I'm especially interested in his prediction about books of the year 2011. Edison claimed that books would be printed on leaves of nickel, "so light to hold that the reader can enjoy a small library in a single volume." On June 23, 1911 the Miami Metropolis published predictions about the year 2011 from the one and only Tommy "Dumbo Killah" Edison.
(Excerpt) Read more at io9.com ...
That was Helen Thomas’s first interview, right?
ping
***Tommy “Dumbo Killah” Edison***
I will assume he was called that because he electrocuted and elephant who had killed his handler.
Edison, a supporter of DC current, also tried to prove AC extremely dangerous by electrocuting a criminal. the criminal kept reviving. It really shook up the reporters there!
the link to Tesla’s predictions was more precise, and interesting.
He was wrong on the metal used, but Edison understated the amount that could be "printed" on a lightweight book to give you a library in one small volume. I think he'd be pleased with a Kindle.
Interesting that the first poster to the article refers to Edison as a “capitalist scumbag”.
BFL. This looks real interesting. I lived in New Jersey for awhile, and part of that time was living in an old house next to an old guy. He talked of working at the Edison Cement Factory just down the road from us (tucked between the farms).
He worked there after dropping out of school after the 4th or 5th grade. Would tell me stories of measuring the weight of the cement and other things. And how he would bring sandwiches to Tommy, bring packages in for Tommy, and other things. After awhile it finally dawned on me, and I asked “Wait, when you say “Tommy”, do you mean Thomas Edison!?” He looked at me funny and said “Well who the hell did you think I was talking about!?” (Still hard to believe I knew a guy that worked for Edison!)
So many things in New Jersey are named “Edison”, and at that time I didn’t realize he was involved with concrete. So I didn’t put him in connection with the factory out in the middle of nowhere were we lived. He built an entire town out of cement that is still standing, and thought concrete was the wave of the future. (He was right on that one too!)
Yes, we’ll agree to anything as long as you promise NOT to post a picture ...
The house of the next century will be furnished from basement to attic with steel, at a sixth of the present cost — of steel so light that it will be as easy to move a sideboard as it is today to lift a drawing room chair. The baby of the twenty-first century will be rocked in a steel cradle; his father will sit in a steel chair at a steel dining table, and his mother’s boudoir will be sumptuously equipped with steel furnishings, converted by cunning varnishes to the semblance of rosewood, or mahogany, or any other wood her ladyship fancies.
~snip~
In the magical days to come there is no reason why our great liners should not be of solid gold from stem to stern; why we should not ride in golden taxicabs, or substituted gold for steel in our drawing room suites. Only steel will be the more durable, and thus the cheaper in the long run.
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Replace ‘steele’ with ‘plastic’ and he would have been right. Tommy should have seen the onset of plastic, right?
Light grade steel is now making huge inroads into residential construction today. Check any Home Depot or Lowes.
The only thing holding back steel framed residential construction is tradition.
He was prescient on that one.
Edison’s prediction was surprisingly accurate, he just got the element wrong. Entire libraries you can put in your pocket are not printed on nickel but silicon.
What you said about framing with steele is very true.
However - it has NOTHING to do with what I posted.
Go back and re-read. I was commenting on Edison’s remarks about FURNISHING a home with steele cribs, tables, chairs and so on.
He advised on many building in early Atlantic City.
When the casinos came in after years of fixin' elections (they finally fixed'um good enough, many 20 bills on the street), the Demolition companies had much egg on face.
The sirens would go off, "Stand back everybody!. . B O O M ! , dust clears, and there's the old building still standing there brushin' off it's balconies & sayin' "Must be 'skeeters 'round here!"
Too bad they didn't use some of those ideas in the Twin Towers,, would be nice if they were able to say the same thing after those explosions!
Quite the Tesla cult over on that page of yours.
Actually, he was.
Thanks for mentioning the Tesla link. I wouldn’t have gone to the article to read anything about Edison. Tesla was THE MAN!
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